1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates, in general, to a roof airbag apparatus for a vehicle and, more particularly, to a roof airbag apparatus for a vehicle designed to inflate, in a front collision of a vehicle, an airbag cushion of small volume, which then expands from a roof of a vehicle to protect the occupants effectively.
2. Description of Related Art
Generally, an airbag apparatus is a vehicle safety device that fills rapidly with air or gas and expands in an automobile collision to protect the upper body of the occupant. The airbag apparatus includes a driver side airbag apparatus for protecting a driver and a passenger side airbag apparatus for protecting a passenger.
The passenger side airbag apparatus of the related art, as shown in FIG. 5A, includes an inflator 40 for generating gas, an airbag cushion 10 that expands with the gas supplied from the inflator 40, a housing 50 with parts mounted therein, and an airbag door 60.
The passenger side airbag apparatus is configured so that, as shown in FIG. 5B, in a normal state, the airbag cushion 10 is stored in the upper side of a crash pad 20, and in a vehicle collision, the airbag door 60 opens in the direction of the windshield glass following reception of a deployment signal from an airbag control unit (ACU) so that the airbag cushion 10 expands to contact the upper portion of the crash pad 20 and the windshield glass 30.
However, such a conventional passenger side airbag apparatus has a problem in that upon deployment of the airbag cushion, the airbag door opens and impacts on and may possibly break the windshield glass.
Further, in order to protect the passenger from a vehicle impact it needs a large-scale airbag that has a volume corresponding to wide space between the crash pad and the passenger, but such a large-scale airbag leads to an increase in the weight of a vehicle and its cost.
Moreover, while there is a difference in design of the crash pad and the windshield glass, such a difference in design also causes the shape and structure of the airbag cushion to differ, making it difficult to determine a standard passenger side airbag apparatus.
The information disclosed in this Background of the Invention section is only for enhancement of understanding of the general background of the invention and should not be taken as an acknowledgement or any form of suggestion that this information forms the prior art already known to a person skilled in the art.